Anyone watch ‘border control’ themed daytime tv programmes?

It wasn't yours, it was Terry's 😉

I was once reinterring NZ from Bali. In front of me was a bloke holding a mask which had hair and a beard made of some sort of animal hair. The officers let me swap queues as we all knew he was going to be there for a long time. I’ve also been pulled aside after my luggage had been through the X-ray machine with officers convinced I had fruit - it was a chocolate orange

I use a wheelchair on holiday and through airports, i am always swabbed like im an actual mule !

I was once selected for a “random drug swab” of my luggage. I had bright pink hair and a Hello Kitty handbag at the time so I doubt it was actually that random. 🤣

I was a good girl though, no beeping on the machine although I swear the guy looked slightly disappointed at that LOL. I wasn’t even off anywhere abroad, was just flying to Aberdeen from Heathrow. I guess as a solo traveller it looked suspicious for that too but I was just heading home after being on an episode of a quiz show. 🙈🤣

When I see the drug smugglers getting caught, I do wonder why they haven’t watched these programmes as research first. They would have learnt some good tips on what not to do.

Joking aside….I watch it with my children about 3 times a week (they are 8 and 11) and the show has provided me with lots of opportunities to educate them about drugs. I’m also pretty confident now that they’ll never try and drug smuggle in the future (be it in suitcases or by swallowing condoms) 🤣

There was one episode I watched where there was a massive metal container of some kind that was seized by customs, maybe off a boat... everything inside the container was kosher, but the scans they did of it looked a bit weird and they couldn't figure out why....then they took the shipping container itself apart and the voids of the walls had been stuffed full of methamphetamine/ephedrine or a similar type of drug, which is obviously banned.

Why is it always amphetamines/ephedrines that are getting smuggled in anyway?! 🥴

I like the very angry, very old Korean grandmas.

The voiceover on the Aussie one is absurdly serious, but also really badly written.

There was a nutty and very high woman in her thirties who was doing odd things to distract attention from her luggage. The script was a brilliant example of how not to construct a sentence with a participle.

"Having stripped off all her clothes in an interrogation room, airport security took the suspect outside to the police transport."

...er....no. Even Aussie security don't have powers like that.

The drug concealments are great fun. My favourite was a shipment of stunning Indian clothes, every button was full of cocaine. They must have taken ages to make.

The pink /blue drama is edge of your seat stuff 😂

Name of programme and channel if you can remember please ☺️

Same here!!! Some really creative ways to get drugs into the country and I love watching them weigh 100 cans of soup to make sure the weight matches what the can should weigh 🤣

And there’s something very satisfying about watching the liquid turn pink or blue in the little sachets when they add the powder to it in order to see if it’s cocaine or heroin 🤣 (or usually ephedrine)

It always bemuses me though when the suitcases are going through the x-ray machines and the images shows the carcasses of dead animals tucked away amongst the shirts and trousers??!!! How do people think they’re going to get away with it?!

Oh yes the mail room is great, the kids toys and boxes of sweets are full to bursting !

I only really like the drug-related ones. Love seeing the absolute denials and then watching them being taken away in handcuffs and the words come up about where the drugs were found and how much it was worth. The unlawful entry and food-related segments are pretty boring.
The food ones where Andrea is screeching about them wrongly ticking the boxes on the card sometimes makes me wonder whether the wording on the card is an accurate translation. So many offenders think that the wording means food that is actually cooked or just meat.

Have you seen the one about the Mexico border? Cars packed full of drugs in the oddest places. Sometimes they're having to pull the cars apart to find them!

Place marking so I remember to watch again. I usually get sucked into Police Interceptors instead.

I always enjoy the mail centre section of those programmes. Because there's no person present with the contraband they can just go straight in with the drilling and chopping. It's amazing how inventive the smugglers are!

and can never understand why they don’t get to keep the food if they pay the fine

Sorry I don't understand who you think should get to keep the food? The people being caught can't obviously because they are coming into Australia/NZ so if they kept the food they'd be bringing it into the country?

On my first trip to NZ around 15-20 years ago now I had worn hiking boots that I'd worn to a farm a few days prior. They gave them such a good clean I've been tempted on future trips to pretend I'd been at a farm just to get them my boots cleaned 😁

I sometimes think these travellers don’t realise that the supermarket has been invented in NZ/Oz!

Yes the fines are large and I wouldn’t.

But I’ve lived in three countries and travelled in about 50. And there were times, in yurts on the steppe, on the beach in Central America, in a hut in Africa, where a hobnob and a cup of decent tea, I would have paid two grand.

People I know have tried it on with haggis, and other banned foods.

Food is love, it’s culture, it’s home. It might be chicken feet to you but it’s a cup of tea and a hobnob to them.

These programmes are crazily funny - the look of shock when 3 roasted ducks are discovered in their underwear!! I always wonder how many people make themselves seriously ill eating those meat products that have sat unrefrigerated for hours in their luggage.

There is also one with Canadian Border control - especially episodes that focus on the land crossing between the Canada and the US with crazy Americans who seem to have no idea that Canada is a totally different country, have filled their vehicles with guns and ammo for a trip to Alaska and are outraged and demand their second amendment rights when calm Canadian border officers confiscate the weapons.

Meant to add... that bag had been through Heathrow, Singapore and Australia security once already and no one else had spotted it!!!!!

I love those programmes and travel to Australia fairly regularly as my ds1 lives there, and I'm always slightly disappointed that I've never got to witness any food smugglers being caught in person yet!

However... had an interesting experience on Thursday flying home from Oz... we were a group of 6 adults and two tiny children leaving Australia. Son in Law's bag got stopped. They insisted they had seen a knife on the scanner. SIL said nope, nothing in there They put it thorugh the scanner muliple times, and emptied everything, were literally about to rip the lining apart when DD2 spotted a hidden zip section under the bottom; yep a tiny camping knife!!!

Turns out the bag was last used about 10 years ago at Reading festival and it's been there ever since! Security were actually pretty nice about it (I think the fact SIL was carrying a baby, helped!)